The Private Wing

by Claire Rayner

  “Now, me old cobber. Give out. What is your problem? Tricia Oxford, here is your friend. Talk away.”

  Tricia smiled thinly. “Ha, ha. Very funny.”

  “No – I suppose it was pretty weak. E for effort? No? Okay, try again. What’s the matter, Trish? What’s up with David?”

  Tricia looked at Ngaire for a long moment, and then said abruptly, “He wants me – he wants us to start sleeping together. Not to wait till we’re married. He’s adamant about my not going on nursing after we’re married, so this is the only answer for him. And for me, if I’m to hang on to my own ideas about working and all that.”

  There was a pause. Then Ngaire said carefully, “I’ve got to think about this. After – after what happened with Pete, my first reaction is as long as a man’s talking about marriage you’ve no problem. I mean, it isn’t that you – any girl – should use sex like – like bait or something. You know, promise to make an honest woman of me and you can have your way with me. It’s more – knowing it’s right between you both, you know? I mean, if you love him, he loves you, where’s the problem, really? You do love him, don’t you, Trish? I know how he is about you – ”

  “Of course I do – ” Tricia started. And then buried her face in her coffee cup again. “Yes, of course I do.”

  Ngaire leaned back and gave her a long considering look. “Then what is it? Morals and that? I mean, do you feel that marriage is what matters when it comes to sex? I’m a bit – oh, I suppose lots of people’d disagree with me. I think what matters is the feeling between people. That and a sense of responsibility about babies, of course. But that’s no problem these days, not really.”

  “I don’t know,” Tricia said, suddenly irritable. “I’ve never thought about it much. And don’t you start on me about being immature – ”

  Ngaire raised her eyebrows. “Who said anything about immature?”

  “It doesn’t matter. No, it isn’t that – moral scruples, I mean. It’s – oh hell, I don’t know. Maybe I’m just not particularly interested in sex. That’s why I – why I found it so difficult to – to just say yes last night.”

  “Last night? After you were with me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hell, you poor old thing. For bad timing that takes some beating.” Ngaire frowned and thought for a moment.

  “Listen, Trish – are you trying to say you don’t – you’re not interested in sleeping with David at all? Or just have doubts about jumping the wedding bells? Because I’ve known you a long time, and I’d have thought – well, I don’t see you as a chilly type lady, not one bit. Never did. You’ve never struck me as being anything but a warm, giving emotional sort of person. I mean, you hit the roof like – like a bomb at all sorts of things. That’s always been your problem, to be honest. You’re not all that controlled a person – and the way you move and all – hell, Trish, I don’t, I couldn’t believe you in the Ice Maiden role.”

  She stopped, and then said a little shyly, “Let me ask leading questions, huh? All this time with David – haven’t you ever got – I mean, what do you do about the love life bit? You haven’t been just holding hands all these years, have you?”

  Tricia smiled a little “No, of course not. We – get together a bit, of course. Neck a little. But – well, this hasn’t come up before. I – I suppose I’ve known always David wanted more than I – I wanted, but I’ve always known, too, that he’d never try to push me too far. He’s a very conventional bod, you know. That’s why he – why we argue so much about my working. In his book, wives don’t go out to work.”

  “So he’s a sweet old fashioned thing. Not such a bad thing at that. It – it must be great to know someone cares enough about you as a person not to – well, not to just take what he wants. But look, Trish – when you do neck a little, as you say – doesn’t that make you feel – hell, you know what I mean! Do I have to spell it out? I may be living in the swinging London scene and all that, but I’m still a nice New Zealander. And we don’t talk that easy about sex. You know what I mean.”

  Tricia nodded. “I know. Well, David makes me feel – loved. Important. Sometimes, after a while, when we’re alone, I’ve got pretty – involved. Had to hold on to my hat, you know? But I can’t pretend I think about it a lot. I mean, I don’t find myself – ” she shrugged. “Eager. Wanting him. Except for being comfortable and loved and – so I guess I’m just a chilly type lady at that.”

  “No. That isn’t on.” There was a long pause, then Ngaire went on softly. “And is that all? No one else you do – who does make you think about being eager? No one else who makes you shiver when you see him?”

  “Shut up!” Tricia put her coffee mug down with a clatter. “Look, don’t you start! I’ve had enough from Bridie Cavanaugh already – I do not – I am not interested in Adam Kidd, and I won’t as long as I’ve a head on my shoulders. All right? So shut up! My problems with David concern David and me, and no one else. Get that clear – ”

  “All right – all right,” Ngaire said, and her voice held no expression. “I’ve got the message very clear. Loud and clear. Not another word. Just a big piece of advice. And for God’s sake, Trish, take it, because I know all the way through to my middle that it’s the best advice you can have. Don’t call David tonight. Don’t call him. Think a bit longer, take your time, and think. Will you do that? To please me?”

  Tricia stood up, and fumbled in her bag for money for the bill. “Yes. I’ll take it. It makes sense at that I suppose. But it’s not because of – ”

  “I know – I know, it’s not because of what I said about someone else. I know. But wait. Look, let’s – ”

  “Let’s nothing, Ny. Do you mind? I’ve had the lousiest of days, and all I want now is to sleep. I’m going to bed. Forgive me, but I want to do the I-want-to-be-alone bit. Okay? Bless you for listening, bless you for advising, and – I’ll see you.”

  And she went, leaving Ngaire staring into her coffee cup, a twisted little smile on her face.

  Tricia tried to accept all of Ngaire’s advice. Certainly she didn’t phone David, but that was the easiest of things to do. Doing nothing, she reminded herself wryly, is no problem. But thinking clearly and calmly about what she should say when she did, that wasn’t so simple.

  As she went about the third floor all the following day, and the day after that, her thoughts chased each other from one side of her head to the other, like a hamster in a cage. And time and again, a sharp visual memory came welling up above her attempts to create careful thoughts. The picture of Adam Kidd holding Maxine Bartlett so very close. The sight of herself standing at the door, staring at them. The feeling of sick furious hate that surged in her when she had seen Adam’s big hand on Maxine’s glinting hair. It was as though, each time, she was a little separate creature, sitting in a corner of the room, staring down at the scene below, watching it acted out, over and over again –

  I don’t care for him. I don’t. I don’t. I don’t. She told herself that over and over again. I don’t. I don’t. It’s just Bridie, with her great Irish imagination putting notions into my head. She flattered me. It doesn’t matter if a man’s a boor, looks like the back of a bus; tell a girl he likes her, and she goes to a jelly. That’s all it is. No more –

  And so it went on. And on and on, until she was moving about her work like an automaton, not really aware of what she was doing, though she managed to do all she had to, relying on the years of training behind her to take her through the mechanical jobs of bedmaking, and treatment giving, and all the rest of it

  But her abstraction was apparent. It was Philip Bartlett who made her realise the fact when she went to make his bed and settle him for the afternoon of the second day after her conversation with Ngaire.

  She had finished the bed, leaving the covers invitingly folded back, and then moved over towards Philip Bartlett in his chair by the window. Her nursing eye noted, almost automatically, that he looked less well, now. He seemed to be dissolving a little each day,
getting thinner, his pallor getting a little more marked. But his eyes under their absurd lashes were as bright as ever, almost too bright.

  He looked up at her now, as she leaned over to unwrap the blanket about his knees, and said softly, “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”

  “I – what’s that?”

  “Well, you’re not here, are you? Bad for a man’s morale that, being in the same room with a girl who is so obviously somewhere else. What is it, pretty delectable Nurse Oxford? Tell your old friend Philip all about it.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry if I’ve been a bit – remote.” Skilfully, she slid one arm behind his back, putting the other hand under his thin elbow, and eased him to his feet. “We’ve – er – we’ve got finals coming up. I haven’t done as much revision as I should, and that’s a fact. I guess I’m thinking about the signs and symptoms and treatment of heart diseases all the time. They’re sure to put that in this year’s paper – I’ll try to forget hearts and think about you whenever I’m in here, I really will.”

  He was on his feet now, and she led him, one arm firmly round his shoulders towards his bed, and felt the weakness in him as he reached it, to stand with his legs braced against it. He moved then, putting his hands on her shoulder, and she let him make her face him, almost instinctively. He was so weak, so thin, that any determined effort on her part to stop him would probably have made him fall.

  He was taller than herself, and she looked up at him, and smiled, trying to produce the coquettish look she knew pleased him, and feeling the sadness about his illness deep behind her eyes and hoping it didn’t show. He knew, she knew, just how ill he was, but the fiction had to be kept up between them, somehow, the fiction that he was going to be well, that he was really quite well now.

  He smiled down at her, and said softly, “My, but it’s a nice face. I’ve always had a fancy for eyes like yours. I had a cat like your eyes, once. A marmalade cat with marmalade eyes. Very naughty cat, was my marmalade cat. Not to put too fine a point on it, a very randy little cat. Out and about all hours of the night, when any other self-respecting feline would be curled up on the boss’s lap. But my marmalade cat only curled up on my lap when she was too tired to seek her outrageous friends on the garden fence. She’d lie there and look at me with that wicked little look in her marmalade eyes, and – well, there they are again, looking up at me from your face. Such naughty eyes – ”

  And, then, he bent his head, and very gently kissed her, his lips hot and dry on hers. And the movement made his weak frame sway, made him cling to her, not in any sudden access of passion, but in a desperate need to hold on to her support. And again acting instinctively, she put up her own arms to hold on to him.

  For a long moment they stood there, not really kissing at all. Just clinging together, their lips touching but not really meaning anything much, and all the pity she had welled up in her, pity for him, for herself, for all the unhappiness there was.

  And then, the sound came, and she realised dimly that the door had opened, and tried to extricate herself, slowly and gently, so as not to topple him from his precarious pose, and it was as though it took a year. She knew there was someone there at the open door, knew she was being watched, but she could only move gently, as though she was a character in a jerky old silent film being run at half speed –

  “Well!” The sound cracked across the room like a whip, and then at last Tricia and Philip were apart, he leaning a little breathlessly against the bed, half sitting on it, she standing beside him, one hand still protectively on his shoulder.

  Sister Cleland was standing at the door, her face white with a sort of triumphant rage that Tricia recognised with a sense of weary inevitability. Something like this had to happen. It had been waiting to happen ever since she had come to work on the floor. And somehow, she just didn’t care. But then her eyes moved, and she saw, standing behind Cleland’s straight back, Maxine Bartlett and Adam Kidd.

  Kidd’s face said nothing to her, nothing at all. He just stood there, silent, looking over Sister Cleland’s shoulder at Philip Bartlett. And Maxine Bartlett – she stood very still too, but her expression was – what? Tricia felt remote, uninvolved as she looked at the beautiful face and tried to assess the thoughts going on behind it. And saw not the surprise or outrage, which she would have expected, but a curious amusement, mixed with a sort of relief. But couldn’t understand why and didn’t really care much anyway. She looked instead at Philip Bartlett, and said softly, “Shall we get you back to bed, Mr Bartlett?”

  He looked at her, and his lips quirked into a grin. “Well, that’s the way the old cookie crumbles, hmm? In flagrante delicto is the phrase, I think. Pity they came so soon, isn’t it? Just think what beautiful music we’d have made if they’d waited a little longer – ”

  “I will put Mr Bartlett back to bed, Nurse.” Cleland’s voice spat across the room. “You go to my office immediately. I’ll deal with you later.”

  “Oh, Sister, nothing to fuss over, is there?” Philip Bartlett said, and there was a sharp note in his voice which Tricia recognised as a return of weariness, held back until now by the excitement of the confrontation. “Nothing to throw a fit about, surely – ”

  “I am not throwing a fit, Mr Bartlett, I assure you. But such behaviour is – well, that is something between myself and my staff. You are not involved – ” Briskly, she came towards him and as Tricia fell back, began to help him out of his dressing gown and into bed.

  “Not involved?” he murmured as he lay back gratefully against his pillows. “Damme, I thought I was involved – didn’t you, Maxine?” and he turned his head to shoot a wicked glance at his wife.

  “As ever, you wretch, as ever,” she said, and then looked at Sister Cleland. “Really, Sister, if – ”

  “If you don’t mind, Mrs Bartlett, this is my concern. Nurse – go at once, do you hear? And on second thoughts, do not go to my office, I have nothing further to say to you. You are to go to your room, and wait there until Matron sends for you. She will do so very soon, I assure you. Now go!”

  At the door, Tricia stopped, because Adam Kidd was still standing there, blocking the way. He looked down at her, and opened his mouth to speak, and then looked across at Sister Cleland, who was now tucking in Philip Bartlett’s counterpane with a controlled anger, and he closed his mouth, and stood to one side.

  And Tricia, her head held high, walked out, and collectedly went along the corridor to pick up her cape, and go to her room in the Nurses’ Home.

  Chapter Twelve

  She sat there, on the edge of the bed, for a very long time.

  She watched the sun move fitfully across the room, creeping from her dressing table stool, to the wardrobe, to the washbasin in the corner, and knew time was passing, but didn’t really feel it.

  For much of the time that she sat there, she didn’t think at all. She just let words and pictures move idly across her mind. Words she had shared with David. Pictures of herself working happily on the general wards. Words Adam Kidd had thrown at her. Pictures of Adam Kidd and Maxine Bartlett, and then of herself and Philip Bartlett –

  And then, quite abruptly, the whole of it shifted, slid into focus. It was like looking at the maddening blur of three-dimensional pictures, and then changing the viewer slightly and seeing it all clear and vivid. The background, and standing out against it in sharp relief the knowledge of what had to be done.

  It was all so easy, really. So short a time ago, it had all been so right. So neat. So comfortably neat in a world that had once threatened to disintegrate around her, back in that winter when her parents had shattered her world by parting from each other. She had painfully built up that security, with David standing as a bulwark on one side, and the hospital and nursing and all that it promised on the other.

  But now, and she had to admit it honestly, she had lost the comfort that was David. He would have to be told. Somehow. But there it was – he had in these past weeks lost all his value as a comforter, as a source
of love and security, because of a stocky man with streaked hair and glasses, who had square hands and a biting tongue and little but scorn for her. She couldn’t dodge it any longer, the truth about him, and God knew, she’d tried. Adam Kidd did matter to her, far too much. The fascination she found in him was more than mere physical attraction. For good or ill, he would always be a part of her, in her memories of these last hateful weeks, inextricably bound up, now, with all her life at the Royal.

  But that was all he could ever be. There was never to be any relationship there. Never to be any peace and comfort to be found with him. It would have to be found away from him – and that meant away from the Royal.

  She stood up, abruptly, and went to sit at her dressing table to stare sombrely at her reflection in the mirror.

  Finish what you start. Finish it even if you hate it, hasn’t that always been what you’ve said? But you’ve been wrong, all this time. There’s no sense in pushing through to a conclusion if it isn’t going to give any satisfaction, is there? Her reflection stared back. Well, is there? the secret buried voice asked again.

  No. No sense at all. There’s more than one way to finish what you start, but you’ve never had the sense to see that. The way to finish what you’ve started here is to cut your losses. Cut them, clean and sharp and painfully – but then, afterwards, you’ll at least be clear of your misery. Eventually.

  How? Sit here and wait for Matron to send for you? One thing’s sure, she told herself with a sudden savage humour. She’ll cut my losses for me, very thoroughly. Necking with private patients – and getting caught doing it by the patient’s wife as well as the Floor Sister and Registrar – is no way to make friends and influence Matrons. Is it?

  “No!” She said it aloud, and the sound of her own voice bounced back at her from the mirror. I’ll do this myself. I’m sick of letting things just happen to me. This, I’ll do myself. I’ll go, right now. I’ll take some gear, just what I need, and I’ll go. I’ve a little money in the bank – enough to see me through till I get a job somewhere. There’s always the YWCA hostel or something. I’ll go, now, and when they send for me, boy, oh boy. Surprise, surprise, Tricia Oxford didn’t wait. For once she had the sense to really finish what she started.